Debasish Mishra, Poetry 2020, Featured Writer

RELATIONSHIP

(for my father)

Forgetting is not a possibility

when you lose something

which is a part of you.

Rather, it helps

when you are inundated 

with remembrance,

with the presence:

here, there, everywhere,

like the memory of gleeful Gulmohurs 

that I last saw in Koraput.

My father, you must have loved me

even before I was born.

And now, I love you more madly

after your physical demise.

Mark the roots of our relationship

which stretch on both sides

of the duration called life.

This durable tree dourly resists 

the pangs of fate and time.

We shared a common birthday.

24th of September was our day.

Father and son together.

Is it a mere coincidence?

Or rather, a divine proof

of how close we were?

United by birthdays:

Father-son, friends, co-birthday-boys.

Now, I'll be celebrating a half of it,

every year.

The other half will be eaten away

by the pain of your absence,

the weight of memory.

When I was young, you gave me

your best shirts.

They fitted me well.

During my college, you always loved

to pick one that was dumped by me.

And towards the last phase,

you gained some weight

and expanded your waist,

much to our collective suprise.

It was your plan, I know,

to be able to wear my unused trousers.

Waist 32: both father and son.

When I travel back, I'll make sure

to pick a couple of your T-shirts

and wear them.

I know, I am not as handsome as you.

You were meant for the camera.

But I'll try to fit into your shoes.

We were much more than just a father and a son.

We were a lot more:

partners-in-rhyme,

friends, brothers, clowns.

And thus, this space that you have left

will always remain unoccupied,

Like a piece of memorial land,

where human habitation is prohibited.

But U will remain there.

Not exactly a status-quo!

I will replace You with U.

You is a formal construct,

Which has been renounced already.

U however is colloquial,

an incorporeal presence,

which defies formal norms

and stands as the stamp

of your Ubiquitous, Universal existence!

U is my answer to the LOSS:

Longings of Soul and Sorrow

as if it is an acrostic.

And this U, unlike You, also forms

The nucleus of what we call oUr.

I can never forget you.

I can only transform You to U

And forge a strong bond again.